Like most little kids, all I aspired to be was 16 years old. I longed for it and counted down to it. I thought 16 was the greatest age possible. Even when I was older than 16, I would have told you that being 16 was as good as life gets. Oh, the independence and the freedom that comes with driving. And dating. And general flirting turned up a notch or two because of those other things. I swung my keys and flung my hair. As perfect as being 16 turned out to be, it got even better....more

When I was younger I always said I wanted to be a "fat, jolly grandmother." I guess I imagined a person who always baked cookies and had a lot of fun and hearty laughs with their grandkids. Of course, that was when I was 16, 105 pounds and had flowing Farrah Fawcett hair, which I was NEVER going to dye, by the way. ...more

Did you guess it from the title?Yep. Me. 40 plus one.As in: four decades plus one year.I know, I know - you'd nevvvver say it by looking at me, would you? ;-) Last year, I didn't write anything about turning 40, which seems a more logical milestone for writing something like this. But, I ignored the entire thing. As in: pretended in never happened. 'Cause I don't know about you, but I'm feeling 22. ...more

Maybe vampires are on to something! I heard about this on NPR this weekend. Researchers at the Stanford School of Medicine put the plasma (blood stripped of cells)from young mice into older mice and found that their brain function improved! The older mice began performing better in spatial memory tests (compared to older mice who received no plasma or older mice who received plasma from other older mice).A study from 2011 found just the opposite is true when you put blood from old mice into young mice; the young mice have decreased brain function....more

This won't be grammatically perfect, nor will it be typo-free. I've been there, done that, all week, all month, all year, for nearly five years at my workplace, and it's Friday evening and I'm tired. in fact it was 5:20 this evening when I first started to think about how cubicles had been emptying quietly since 4 PM and as I delivered documents to a few empty cublicles I heard the twenty- and thirty-somethings making plans for an impromptu evening together for themselves and their significant others, wine and dinner somewhere....more

In the modeling world, 24 is practically ancient. When it comes to brain skills, we seem to be getting the same messages.I ran across this article about how our cognitive skills begin declining after age 24.http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/275645.phpMany people think of middle age as 45 or so, because that's when age-related declines start to show a bit more....more

I have a TV shopping channel on the background as I am trying to get some things together and thought how sad things are for women**as far as cosmetics go**.You “need” a serum for morning and night, you need a bb cream, cc cream, and a gallon of tar….**joking**. I mean, seriously, do you see a really big run by guys to stores for the same stuff they shamelessly shill women for on tv? We aren’t speaking $5.00 either. I just heard one price as $104.00....more

I'm sorry. Let me say this in the kindest possible way. Asking me what I will do to stay 'young at heart' as I get older is ageist.Why would anyone assume that it is better to be young at heart than old at heart unless being old at heart implied a lot of unpleasant, undesirable things. Of course, that wasn't the intention. Assuming that young is better is a deep cultural belief, one that is, unfortunately, absorbed by many people as they age, making them mourn their younger selves rather than enjoying the age they are....more

Yikes! Insomniacs take note: New research from the University of Pennsylvania indicates that long-term sleep deprivation can cause lasting brain damage. The study on mice (which are surprisingly quite similar to humans in terms of the effects of experiments) found that when they were put on a sleep schedule that resembles that of human shift workers, they had significant damage to the locus coeruleus (a bundle of nerve cells associated with cognitive function and alertness). The mice actually lost 25% of those neurons!Crazy, huh?Here's what I read:...more